Neat Freak
by Sinnii
Summary: Sephiroth had his habits. SLASH!


Hey guys!

Sorry anyone reading my other fics, this is not an update.

I recently returned home from staying with Skiba and I started feeling a bit lonely and sad. I was also fairly upset because... well the atmosphere in my house can be quite grating on the nerves. I've been trying to get myself to work on Chapter 7 of **Onward to Ruin**, but I haven't been able to get into the mindset; needless to say, it made me feel pretty down.

But after having a nice little breakdown and receiving yet another pep talk from Skiba, I went from depressed to bored. So, desperate to write _something_ I asked Skiba to give me a random prompt for me to work off of. She gave me "Frustration" which was perfect since I tend to channel my own feelings into characters in certain situations, and I would certainly be able to channel frustration tonight. It was perfect. So after some short discussion and a little musing, I set to work, and this is what I came up with.

Skiba seemed to enjoy it, and with a bit of editing on her part and mine, I decided to submit it.

There's really nothing to warn against except some very slight slash. If slash isn't your thing, sorry.

For those that read, hope you enjoy it! As always, I appreciate hearing you thoughts, so review~

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><p>Sephiroth would admit that Zack was a mystery to him. Nearly every personality trait that the silver-haired man found to be nearly unbearable was nestled into one single happy-go-lucky brunette… yet Sephiroth was surprised to realize that said brunette did not bother him in the least.<p>

Zack was loud, hyperactive, and most of all he was restless. From passive observation, he seemed to be even a bit much for some of his peers to handle. But even his boundless energy did not seem to deter Sephiroth. Even when the two were stuck closed up in the office, when Zack would spend most of his time fidgeting, shifting about, pacing, and just overall creating what would normally be a distraction, Sephiroth was completely unaffected. He'd actually become accustomed to the noise, finding that he missed it when Zack had been needed on a two-day mission near Kalm.

So, Sephiroth had concluded fairly early on in the relationship that he would be able to get along fairly well with his fellow first.

That was until he entered his apartment one day after a mission.

Sephiroth was an extremely neat person by nature; years of living in a sterile lab made it hard for him to really handle a lack of cleanliness. Everything in his office and living space was carefully organized, set in a specific order almost in an obsessive compulsive fashion. He cleaned constantly, organized constantly, and he especially did so before he left on a mission, finding it comforting to return from dirt, grime, and blood back to his clean home.

He'd spent all day the previous day making certain that everything would be in its proper place upon his return. He'd gone to sleep in a neat apartment and left the same apartment the next morning.

What he was facing at this moment was _not_ his apartment.

Upon entering his living room, Sephiroth found clothing strewn about the floor, a shirt thrown carelessly over the arm of his couch, a pair of socks sitting on his coffee table. From where he stood, he was able to peer into his kitchen and see that whatever meal had been prepared, everything used to cook it had been left out, unwashed. His nose was not greeted by the clean scent of his cleaning supplies, but rather a strange odor of dirty laundry and... old food.

He did _not _go into the kitchen, not wanting to see what else could in there. Instead, he ventured into the hallway, then into his bedroom and froze.

It was a disaster.

It felt as if his brain had shorted out at the deplorable sight of his room, his _bed_, and in the midst of the _carnage_ his romantic partner lay nestled beneath his sheets, a comforter, and… more laundry. The more he looked around, the stronger that feeling in the pit of his stomach became. He shook with increasing agitation, and the sound of Zack snoring away in the middle of it only served to grind his nerves all the more.

"_Zack_!" The name came out as a deep but loud snarl; he hadn't intended for it to come out that way, but in his anger, he forgot himself for just a moment.

Regardless, Zack bolted up at the sound, his spiky hair sticking out every which way. Sephiroth would have found the sight endearing were he not so… bothered with the state of his living space. The younger man sat there, drowsily rubbing at one of his eyes and let out a loud yawn before speaking.

"Seph? Mn—di'n't think you'd be back so soon…"

He felt his eye twitch just the slightest.

"Zack," he began after a moment, trying to remain rational. "Would you care to explain why my living space is in its current state?"

Zack yawned again before looking up at him.

"Hnn?"

"My apartment. Why does it look this way?"

He watched as Zack looked sleepily around the bedroom a look of slight confusion passing over his face.

"Zack, I cleaned this place thoroughly before I left for my mission. Now I return only a day later to find it a _disaster_."

"Oh, it doesn't look that bad—"

A snarl silenced him quickly and blue eyes widened in surprise and what Sephiroth noticed as slight fear. Immediately, he strode to one side of the bed, and in a flash grabbed Zack by the back of his neck in the same way one might hold a puppy by its scruff. He pulled the young man off of the bed and to his feet, before tilting his head up.

"Regardless of how _you_ may think it looks, the current state of _my home_ is _unacceptable_."

He could hear Zack swallow.

"You are going to clean this entire place—" Zack opened his mouth the say something and Sephiroth held up his other hand to silence him. "I am needed in my office to compile reports from the mission. When I return tonight, this place _will_ be restored to the state I had left it prior to my departure."

"But—"

"If my demands are not met Zack, you can just pack the belongings you have here and return to staying in your own quarters," Sephiroth said in an unnervingly calm tone, but the clear tension on his face and the way his eye twitched, Zack clearly knew he was anything but. "I allowed you to stay here with me because I enjoy you company. However, I will not tolerate blatant disrespect of _my_ space. Do you understand?"

Zack's lips parted, but nothing other than a nervous squeak left his mouth. He just shut his mouth and nodded dumbly, Sephiroth releasing his hold on the young man, turning his back and briskly leaving the apartment.

0o0

Sephiroth honestly didn't know what to expect when he returned. Truthfully, he inwardly dreaded what he'd open his door to find.

Slowly, he entered the apartment, and his eyes widened. To his pleasant surprise, his nose was greeted by the clean scent he tended to look forward to upon coming home. The living room was cleared of all the dirty clothing, and all of the surfaces had even been dusted. He decided to go into his bedroom next and found all the laundry put away in the proper spot he'd assigned for Zack's belongings. The bed was well made, the covers smoothed out nicely, and even the bedside table had been wiped down.

The bathroom, which he hadn't had the desire to see, looked just as he'd left it, however he knew Zack had still cleaned because he was instantly able to notice a few things not in their proper space. He let this slide, however; he understood that Zack was not yet—and likely never would be—very familiar with his system of organization, and he was just happy at the fact that it was cleaned and the job done with the same attention he would invest.

He came back into the living room with a small smile on his face and ventured into the kitchen where he saw Zack scrubbing away at one of the many dishes he'd dirtied. The rest of them were dried and put away or still in the sink soaking and waiting to be cleaned. Sephiroth stood at the entrance to the kitchen and didn't make a sound, watching Zack go about his task. He seemed intent on making sure that everything was just as clean as he could get it, and from what Sephiroth noticed, the dishes were the very last thing he'd done, the rest of the kitchen very much clean.

Once the dishes were put away, Zack turned and jumped at the sight of Sephiroth watching him. But his expression immediately turned into an apologetic one and he looked down.

Sephiroth sighed softly and slowly made his way to him, pulling him close in a rare show of affection. He could hear the slight surprised noise Zack made before he felt the other's arms slowly move up to embrace him.

"I hadn't expected it to look this way," Sephiroth said softly, and he felt Zack tense. He chuckled gently. "It looks very nice. Thank you, Zack."

"Sorry," Zack muttered into his shoulder, and Sephiroth shook his head.

"Perhaps I overreacted just slightly." He pulled away so he could look into Zack's face. "But you must understand. The way I lived for most of my life… I am very much accustomed to things being extremely clean."

He looked away a bit, a slight blush on his face. "I… can also be quite a bit obsessive when it comes to the way things are, but I cannot rightfully expect you to understand when we have not been together very long. I am just glad that you put forth this much effort."

The tentative smile that came to Zack's face made a pleasant warm feeling rise in his chest, and he smile himself, pressing a kiss to Zack's lips.

He let Zack come closer and hug him tightly… but once Zack tried to press a kiss to his throat, Sephiroth halted him. In his mind, Zack had not been adequately punished, and he would deliver in what he knew was plenty acceptable.

He knew Zack would learn his lesson after going two weeks without intimacy.

0o0

From that point on, Zack no longer allowed the apartment to fall into such a state as he had left it. However, Sephiroth would become occasionally irked when he returned to his apartment to find Zack in the shower and his clothes on the floor near the door. However, he allowed it to slide whenever Zack would exit and immediately put the clothing in its proper place in the hamper. Sephiroth supposed the man was just set in certain ways, but so long as Zack cleaned up after himself, he had no further complaints.

Sometimes he was almost thankful for the slight messes; they would give him some minor tasks to attend to whenever he was restless or otherwise nervous.

The next time Sephiroth left for a mission, he cleaned as he always did the night before. He left the apartment in the same clean condition the next morning, and when he returned, he found it just as clean as he'd left it, Zack sitting on the couch, looking at him with a slightly accomplished look on his face.

"Welcome home. I was a good boy and didn't touch nothin'!"


End file.
